Chapter 172

Chapter 172: A Tangled Plot

Night grew deep.

The group split up to act.

Liu Jun Cheng and Jiang Yi followed Liu An to check all the clues he had found. Li Shuang and Luo Ming Yue slipped into the imperial city to investigate in secret. Sui Jin went to sound out Ye Zhao Zhao.

The imperial city lay silent, and heavy rain poured down. Black clouds hung low overhead, as if ready to crush the rooftops at any time.

For this search, Luo Ming Yue was in charge of checking on the current ruler of the Chenrong Kingdom, Emperor Chen Lie. Li Shuang would cover the other areas. If Emperor Chen Lie had a problem, the people closest to him should be the first to show something wrong. Li Shuang’s top targets were the concubines in the rear palace.

Since the emperor did not visit the harem tonight, most concubines had gone to bed early. The few who were still awake became Li Shuang’s focus. Letting her spiritual sense spread, she patiently listened in.

From their whispers she learned that before Emperor Chen Lie took the throne, everything had been normal. After he ascended, he never stepped into the harem again. For mortals, heirs are very important, and that is even more true for an emperor. Yet Emperor Chen Lie is already past thirty, and the harem has no children at all. He is not anxious. He even insists on staying away from the harem. Even when the court made a loud fuss, he did not change and still did whatever he wanted.

After some complaining, the women drifted off to sleep.

Li Shuang could not help sinking into thought. [This emperor has a problem. That much is almost certain. But is he truly the one behind the scenes? That is still unclear.]

Leaving the concubines’ quarters, Li Shuang moved fast and began to sweep through other parts of the palace.

In the rear palace, the most heavily guarded places, besides the emperor’s own residence, included one more location.

It was the Former Emperor’s tomb.

Li Shuang was truly surprised when she realized this. She was not ignorant of the mortal world. In general, imperial tombs are built elsewhere at sites with fine mountains and rivers. No one would set a tomb right inside the palace.

Yet this Former Emperor had done exactly that. Even more shocking, this absurd decision had actually been carried out, and after so many years no one had questioned it.

Avoiding the outer guards, Li Shuang slipped straight into the tomb.

It was bone-chillingly cold within. The coffin was carved from a single block of Froststone. If it were only Froststone, that would be nothing special, but a bean sized point of light moved slowly over the coffin’s surface.

This was Ice Marrow, the essence that only thousand-year Froststone can produce. Ice Marrow is a rare treasure, of great use even to a Cultivator at the Divine Transformation Stage.

Yet the one using this coffin was only a mortal emperor.

Li Shuang felt no greed toward the Ice Marrow, but her curiosity about the late Emperor Chen Yang grew stronger. The last two emperors of the Chenrong Kingdom both seemed wrong in some way.

She stepped up. Through the clear coffin lid, she could see the body of a man lying within. He wore a dragon robe and a court crown. He had to be Emperor Chen Yang.

Thinking for a moment, Li Shuang traced a Barrier Formation to seal off any sound or motion. Then, expressionless, she opened the coffin.

She reached out to touch the body.

A strange thing happened.

Her hand passed straight through Emperor Chen Yang’s “corpse” and touched the icy coffin bottom.

Li Shuang’s eyes flashed with a peculiar look.

An Illusory Formation.

The inside of the coffin was etched with an Illusory Formation. Emperor Chen Yang’s body was not here at all.

No. Perhaps it was better to say that Emperor Chen Yang had not died.

[Where is he now? What does he want to do? And where did he get a treasure like Ice Marrow?]

Li Shuang did not disturb the place. She restored everything, cleaned up all traces of her visit, and left without a sound.

In the dark night and pouring rain, she sped through the whole palace to investigate again.

Everywhere else seemed normal, calm as still water.

It looked like the problem lay with the two emperors.

Li Shuang was about to circle back and compare findings with Luo Ming Yue when she paused, her face shifting slightly as she studied the palace layout.

[Not right.]

[Something is off.]

Some buildings looked newly built and did not match the rest at all. If you connected these new structures together in your mind, a pattern emerged.

Li Shuang’s pupils tightened.

She remembered that midnight on Central Avenue, when the Copper Devil Guard had carved a Grand Bloodfiend Body-Refining Grand Array. At the time, the Heaven and Earth Furnace had said it was a simplified version that could only refine the true blood of mortals. Li Shuang had assumed that the massive array in the Underground Kingdom, the one that could refine the true blood of Cultivators, must be the complete version.

But now, looking over the imperial city in the dark, her heart pounded.

[Not right.]

[It is not only that.]

She could not worry about anything else. She paid the price in resources and traded for an answer from the Heaven and Earth Furnace.

The Heaven and Earth Furnace replied without emotion: “Grand Bloodfiend Body-Refining Grand Array, complete version: it can refine true blood, and it can also refine fortune. Within the Formation’s range, whether the fortune of one person or of one nation, it can be refined. If a person’s fortune is refined, that one person dies. If a nation’s fortune is refined, that nation is destroyed.”

Li Shuang’s heart trembled wildly. She paid more and asked at once: “Has the Formation already been set? If it has, how do we destroy it?”

The Heaven and Earth Furnace answered: “The Formation is complete and requires Imperial Clan blood to activate. It is dormant now. No one below Spirit Refinement can break it by force. Others who wish to destroy it must wait until it appears. Tomorrow night at midnight, when the stars flush with blood and the Royal Sovereign Star appears, the Formation will start on its own. The instant it starts is also its weakest moment. Find the Formation’s core and break it, and the Formation will be undone.”

Li Shuang’s heart gave a hard thud and seemed to drop away.

[Tomorrow night at midnight.]

They had thought they still had time. They had not expected this.

[Tomorrow night at midnight.]

Tomorrow night at midnight, the Formation covering the entire palace would activate.

This Formation would seize the fortune of all living beings, the fate of the whole nation. If it takes one person’s fortune, it kills one person. If it takes a nation’s fortune, it ends a nation.

If this array truly starts, the entire Chenrong Kingdom will be thrown into a calamity beyond measure. The mortals who would die would not be one or two, but in the hundreds of millions.

Li Shuang drew a long breath, then vanished into the rain.

Sui Jin, making small talk, suddenly asked: “So, there really is no Devil Path aura in this imperial city?”

Ye Zhao Zhao shook her head: “The Devil Seeking Bell has never reacted, so there shouldn’t be. Fellow Daoist Sui, let me pour you another cup.”

Sui Jin was about to keep up the pretense when his eyes flickered. Finding a casual excuse, he left first.

Watching his back, Ye Zhao Zhao showed a puzzled look. They had been getting along well a moment ago. Maybe he wanted to take it slow. She was in no rush. In her view, the fact that Sui Jin came to her on his own already meant he had a good impression of her. Winning him over was only a matter of time.

Sensing something, Ye Zhao Zhao spoke into the air: “System, you seem unusually quiet today.”